Contents of a web page may include text and images. So called “hyperlinks” may be embedded in any of the text or image areas of a web page. A hyperlink embedded in a given web page allows someone accessing the given page to access another web page which is the destination of the link. In this way, hyperlinks allow a web user to navigate through a variety of web pages across different web sites or within a common web site and access numerous pieces of information.
A hyperlink has two major parts, namely, a representation and the underlying code. The representation is visible to the end user and is usually in the form of a character string, graphical image, or other visual element of a web page indicating the presence of a hyperlink. When an end user viewing a given web page moves the cursor over a hyperlink, the cursor changes its shape, the hyperlink's visible representation is altered, or some other clue is given to the end user that a cursor click on that part of the web page would activate the hyperlink.
The underlying code of a hyperlink is not visible to the end user. The underlying code is usually in the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) format and contains the Universal Resource Locator (URL) of the link destination and some additional information. When the end user activates a hyperlink (e.g., as described above), the underlying code is executed by the end user's computer. This causes the computer to access and present to the end user the web page designated by the destination URL and possibly to transmit some additional information on the network.
Hyperlinks may be embedded in a web page for promotional or commercial purposes. For example, to increase web users' awareness of a merchant's web site and offers presented therein, other web sites may serve as referrals to the merchant's web site. The owners of such referring web sites are termed affiliates, associates, or business partners and the like of the referred merchant. Typically, a referring web site has one or more web pages that recite the referred merchant by company name, web site, description of products or services, etc. and ultimately make reference to the pertinent web page of the referred merchant. A hyperlink is coupled to the reference, and upon the end user's selection of the reference on the referring web page, a referred merchant's web page is presented to the end user. Consequently, the end user begins interacting with the referred merchant's web site.
Support for such linking from a referring web site to the referred merchant's web site requires the appropriate code (e.g., the underlying code of a hyperlink to the referred merchant's web site) to be embedded in a web page of the referring web site.
From the foregoing discussion, one can see the importance of error-free generation of the HTML code including the URL underlying commercial and promotional hyperlinks. Thus, there is a need for a web development tool that enables the proper embedding of hyperlinks and reduces errors in the process.